Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)

DATE=3/7/2003

TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT

TITLE= RUSSIA-US TREATY (S)

NUMBER=2-300435

BYLINE= LISA MCADAMS

DATELINE= MOSCOW

CONTENT=

VOICED AT:

INTRO: Russia has welcomed the Senate's ratification of a Russian-American treaty calling for major reductions in both countries' nuclear-weapons stockpiles. V-O-A's Lisa McAdams in Moscow has details.

TEXT: Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister, Georgy Mamedov, hailed Thursday's unanimous ratification of the pact in the U-S Senate as a sign of the new strategic partnership between the United States and Russia.

Mr. Mamedov said Russia's lower house of parliament, the Duma, should ratify the treaty within two-weeks.

The accord calls for the United States and Russia to reduce their strategic long-range nuclear weapons arsenals by two-thirds, to between 17-hundred and 22-hundred weapons each.

Ratification of the accord has been a top priority for Moscow before the planned U-S-Russian summit in St. Petersburg this May.

Russia's Interfax news agency quotes two Duma deputies as saying they do not foresee any obstacles to the treaty's ratification. But the deputies are also quoted as saying the Duma debate could become complicated, if the United States decides to attack Iraq without a specific U-N mandate. (SIGNED)

NEB/LAM/AWP/RAE